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[Blue Ninja]

Man, that final mission was really disappointing. This is my game of the year, but holy hell if I wasn't underwhelmed at Ad Victoriam. The fact that none of my achievements unlocked didn't help, either.

I decided to save the kid/synth. Dunno why.

Was really hoping for at least a Perlman-esque narration at the end instead of just a short video.

I don't suppose the other final missions are any better?

 

[Eusis]

Gave in and read some spoilers. Not as terrible seeming as I feared, I kind of expected the basic twist with Shaun just because of cryo freezing giving a ripe opportunity for that sort of time disparity. Being potentially the main villain... Well, I did wonder if maybe being drafted to the antagonist's side but not quite like that.

 

[Blue Ninja]

Fuck, I missed the option to evacuate citizens from the Institute. Now Garvey's calling me a mass murderer.

Ah well, not like I'm never gonna do a replay.

 

[Noray]

I don't suppose the other final missions are any better?

They're all bad and underwhelming and suffer from the game forcing a choice on you in the least organic way possible and giving you no choice whatsoever in how you want to do things other than "Murder these people" or "murder those other people"

 

[Blue Ninja]

Nothing's gonna top the Battle of Hoover Dam, I guess. The way everything came together there, if you did enough effort, was just fantastic.

I mean, you can convince Maxson to spare Danse, it's not too much of a stretch to convince him to stop going on a synth-killing spree and just focus on destroying the source. Get the Railroad involved. Have the Minutemen show up during the fight to help. That shit would've been cool.

 

[jrcbandit]

I liked A LOT of the stories in FO4. I could make a long list of stuff that was quite interesting and memorable.

The institute stuff where you are working undercover for them while still working for father. Covertly meeting with synths who want to be freed.

The whole side quest with that family who is hundreds of years old but they live because this serum from thier father. An interesting twist on the vampire trope.

The Diamond Radio DJ quest line that changes his personality.

Most of the side kick quests or stories were great. I got a kick out of the Deacon one. Because I thought he was a synth but he fooled me. Quest to cure Caits addiction to drugs. Nick the detective and that mobster who intentionally made himself a ghoul.

The mutant guy who escaped from the institute. He turns back into a man if you find his secret lab in the institute.

The Silver Shroud quests.

The robot pirates.

The stolen deatclaw egg thing. Very cool!

I could go on.

Where should I look for robot pirates and stolen deathclaw egg quests? I missed those ;p.


The whole story fell apart once you entered the Institute. There was no nefarious evil plan by the Institute so why do I need to destroy all the tech there which could greatly benefit the Commonwealth, and if you are working for the railroad that would mean no more synths ever being created... It especially makes no sense since you are the new leader and can lead the Institute down a more benign path with helping the outside world some and not replacing humans any more with synths. What was that human-synth replacement even about? I never got an explanation for it in game, why not just use new Synths with fabricated memories - that way they wont be caught for acting different than the original incarnation.

Destroying the institute makes more sense being with the Brotherhood since they destroy any hi-tech technology users for the "good" of humanity.

Also, the lack of options in any of the final paths was annoying. As leader of the Institute, I understand destroying the Brotherhood since they are such a large threat. But the railroad is a minor nuisance who could be brought into the fold if the gen 3 Synths were treated better. No reason to murder them all.

 

[Noray]

Where should I look for robot pirates and stolen deathclaw egg quests? I missed those ;p.


The whole story fell apart once you entered the Institute. There was no nefarious evil plan by the Institute so why do I need to destroy all the tech there which could greatly benefit the Commonwealth, and if you are working for the railroad that would mean no more synths ever being created... It especially makes no sense since you are the new leader and can lead the Institute down a more benign path with helping the outside world some and not replacing humans any more with synths. What was that human-synth replacement even about? I never got an explanation for it in game, why not just use new Synths with fabricated memories - that way they wont be caught for acting different than the original incarnation.

Destroying the institute makes more sense being with the Brotherhood since they destroy any hi-tech technology users for the "good" of humanity.

Also, the lack of options in any of the final paths was annoying. As leader of the Institute, I understand destroying the Brotherhood since they are such a large threat. But the railroad is a minor nuisance who could be brought into the fold if the gen 3 Synths were treated better. No reason to murder them all.

the robot pirates is the big ship, USS Discovery iirc, you can see it in boston on a building. The deathclaw is the salem witch museum.

And yeah it's really disappointing how little bethesda cared about their story, like you just poked numerous holes in it without even really trying. You don't have to be particularly discerning or critical to find major flaws in FO4's story and writing and quest design, it's all really, really half-assed and feels like no one thought very long about anything.

 

[David Incorporated Esq.]

And the Institute's blasé attitude about synths in general, and how their story does NOTHING about it. Oh free will? Yeah some sort of bug, whatever. Yeah sure the synths beg and plead not to be reset but you know no big deal.

"Oh okay, Shaun, sounds good to me no more questions herp derp."

Oh nevermind it's been beaten to death already.

Bethesda go back to Elder Scrolls games.

 

[Whaleman]

And the Institute's blasé attitude about synths in general, and how their story does NOTHING about it. Oh free will? Yeah some sort of bug, whatever. Yeah sure the synths beg and plead not to be reset but you know no big deal.

"Oh okay, Shaun, sounds good to me no more questions herp derp."

Oh nevermind it's been beaten to death already.

Bethesda go back to Elder Scrolls games.

Well I thought that in the end they hinted that Shaun may have started to understand that synths may be more with the tape he leaves with synth Shaun. There are also a few institute missions that show that maybe not all institute members are on the same page with this that its mostly retention pushing them. But yeah I do wish there was more ability in game to call out the factions at some points on their logic.

 

[Meowster]

Did you guys feel this was a better or worse storyline than Fallout 3's?

 

[Olengie]

If you were the Leader of the Institute, couldn't there be an option where you work with the Brotherhood instead? Or in fact, just have the Institute join forces with the BoS. Idk, that's just my opinion.

If that wasn't possible, I rather have the BoS take all the high tech Institute technology first and then destroy the location if it came to that. They did have Teleportation technology.

About synths. Are they able to "grow"? If you had Synth Shaun with you and ten years pass, wouldn't people find it strange that Shaun hasn't aged at all.

 

[Eusis]

Did you guys feel this was a better or worse storyline than Fallout 3's?

It SEEMS from what I spoiled myself on that it isn't as criminally stupid, (do Fallout 3 spoilers matter here?

Spoiler

there isn't anything as blatantly stupid as cannibalizing the GECK to purify water that innately wouldn't be able to stay radiated ANYWAY, versus using this magic MacGuffin device to just purify a large area of land and make it safely habitable.

But it does sound like there's a lot of situations that get frustrating due to very poor logic on the part of the characters themselves. It did sound like the Institute would have easily been far more good than bad for the wasteland, but your options are basically them or everyone else.

 

[PuppetMaster]

I have yet to play the other ones you mention, but the Confidence Man quest (Diamond City DJ) has absolutely terrible design, specially for a Fallout game.
You can't warn, stop or persuade anyone. No matter what you say, the fight will take place regardless. You can't change the plan, the fight or the odds, and you can't intimidate or persuade the thugs.
Then, no matter what you do, you have to go see Scarlett and Vadim is kidnapped. Regardless of your decisions, Travis will come along and you have to kill the raiders in the brewery to rescue Vadim.

This is worse than the average BioWare quest, there isn't even an illusion of choice. It is quite telling that Vadim himself tells you something like "You want to help Travis, show up after 6, otherwise we'll do it without you."
It's almost like it's breaking the 4th wall there. "Sorry, player, this is what we made and this is what happens, deal with it or fail the quest".

At least in BioWare games you know you're supposed to be the good guy and you're playing a pre-existing character. In the Mass Effect series, you have to be Shepard, "a goddamn hero", but you have the Chaotic/Lawful Good approaches all the time, at least. Here the only option besides being the good guy doing things for charity is to roll a speech check for more caps.
Fallout used to be about the player's own character, and there should always be multiple ways to solve these things. It's so fundamental to the series that it was in the vision statement for Fallout 1, and it's one of the reasons the originals and FNV were so great.

What about the part where they recorded TWO totally separate DJ commentary styles! Depending one whether or not you do the quest how the DJ talks is totally different.

What other single game is doing that!?


But your issues is with the part where you were not able to choose to fight? I guess some people cannot see the doughnut because of the hole.

 

[jrcbandit]

It SEEMS from what I spoiled myself on that it isn't as criminally stupid, (do Fallout 3 spoilers matter here?

Spoiler

there isn't anything as blatantly stupid as cannibalizing the GECK to purify water that innately wouldn't be able to stay radiated ANYWAY, versus using this magic MacGuffin device to just purify a large area of land and make it safely habitable.

But it does sound like there's a lot of situations that get frustrating due to very poor logic on the part of the characters themselves. It did sound like the Institute would have easily been far more good than bad for the wasteland, but your options are basically them or everyone else.

For the Institute, if you go with them you get to make a speech and can edit it to be more friendly and sound like that they are going to help the above grounders. Shaun comments on your interesting take, it't disappointing that Bethesda didn't allow for this to develop further.At least you weren't made to go after the Minutemen when joining the Institute, warring with that faction doesn't make much sense.... Especially not when you ally with the Minutemen, why exactly did the Institute go after the Castle in that game route?? All it did was piss the Minutemen off so they nuke the Institute.

The end game was just poorly thought out and inflexible. I enjoyed the Brotherhood path because at least it follows in the Brotherhood's beliefs and Liberty Prime rocks. All the other paths, I was wondering why exactly I was going to such extremes of wiping out the other factions instead of using their tech, making a truce, etc.

Also, what were the Institute goals? They were just kind of hand waived, nuclear power, synths, stay underground = future of mankind! If Synths were treated as non-sentient slave labor, how were they the future of mankind? What was the point of kidnapping and replacing people with synths? Strategically, it would only make sense for high value targets like the Brotherhood leadership, railroad leaders, etc. Regular people like the daughter of the caravan leader there is absolutely no point.

Was there a plot line for Diamond City that I missed? Why were people being kidnapped and why did the mayor not have anyone investigate? It couldn't be for the Institute, what the hell do they want with highly irradiated grounders instead of pure samples like Shaun.

 

[Ogimachi]

What about the part where they recorded TWO totally separate DJ commentary styles! Depending one whether or not you do the quest how the DJ talks is totally different.

What other single game is doing that!?


But your issues is with the part where you were not able to choose to fight? I guess some people cannot see the doughnut because of the hole.

I don't care about the DJ commentary, doesn't make a difference as far as RPG design is concerned. It's a reaction to events in which my character had no input other than follow the exact path the developer laid out for me. Unless I failed the quest, everything would've happened in the same way, regardless of anything I tried to say or do.

That is my issue. It was an absolutely linear quest design with no agency, no alternatives and an extremely poor illusion of choice. That's not good RPG, and it's defintely not how a Fallout game should play.

 

[Basileus777]

Was there a plot line for Diamond City that I missed? Why were people being kidnapped and why did the mayor not have anyone investigate? It couldn't be for the Institute, what the hell do they want with highly irradiated grounders instead of pure samples like Shaun.

The mayor of Diamond City is a synth plant working for the Institute. I'm not sure what use any of those people are though.

 

[PuppetMaster]

I don't care about the DJ commentary, doesn't make a difference as far as RPG design is concerned. It's a reaction to events in which my character had no input other than follow the exact path the developer laid out for me. Unless I failed the quest, everything would've happened in the same way, regardless of anything I tried to say or do.

That is my issue. It was an absolutely linear quest design with no agency, no alternatives and an extremely poor illusion of choice. That's not good RPG, and it's defintely not how a Fallout game should play.

I would argue it was a very tangle world changing event. And not the illusion of choice most other games opt for.

You didn't have to do the quest at all. You chose to walk into that random bar and talk to random people which triggered a chain of events. The game never tells you need to do. And once triggered, events happen that are outside of your control. But that is not unlike real life.

 

[skyhaven]

The mayor of Diamond City is a synth plant working for the Institute. I'm not sure what use any of those people are though.

And there's no way to confront him about it.
Because ..Bethesda.

 

[Eusis]

It really just kind of sounds like the institute is trolling everyone by throwing them around.

Or maybe it's just to keep a tab on things and put them in POTENTIALLY influential positions.

 

[Andodalf]

For the Institute, if you go with them you get to make a speech and can edit it to be more friendly and sound like that they are going to help the above grounders. Shaun comments on your interesting take, it't disappointing that Bethesda didn't allow for this to develop further.At least you weren't made to go after the Minutemen when joining the Institute, warring with that faction doesn't make much sense.... Especially not when you ally with the Minutemen, why exactly did the Institute go after the Castle in that game route?? All it did was piss the Minutemen off so they nuke the Institute.

The end game was just poorly thought out and inflexible. I enjoyed the Brotherhood path because at least it follows in the Brotherhood's beliefs and Liberty Prime rocks. All the other paths, I was wondering why exactly I was going to such extremes of wiping out the other factions instead of using their tech, making a truce, etc.

Also, what were the Institute goals? They were just kind of hand waived, nuclear power, synths, stay underground = future of mankind! If Synths were treated as non-sentient slave labor, how were they the future of mankind? What was the point of kidnapping and replacing people with synths? Strategically, it would only make sense for high value targets like the Brotherhood leadership, railroad leaders, etc. Regular people like the daughter of the caravan leader there is absolutely no point.

Was there a plot line for Diamond City that I missed? Why were people being kidnapped and why did the mayor not have anyone investigate? It couldn't be for the Institute, what the hell do they want with highly irradiated grounders instead of pure samples like Shaun.

One farm is mentioned to be replaced with synths so they can study crops top side, I imagine others are spies. Others are taken to be used in the FEV experiments.

 

[PuppetMaster]

It really just kind of sounds like the institute is trolling everyone by throwing them around.

Or maybe it's just to keep a tab on things and put them in POTENTIALLY influential positions.

A terminal in the institute tells you the names of the people working with the institue. And it is most of the caravan traders. As well as Tommy who was Caits handler. And some other names I did not recognize.

 

[Seyavesh]

Did you guys feel this was a better or worse storyline than Fallout 3's?

the entire last act basically devolves into fawkes+rad chamber level stupidity for it's entire stretch and then capsizes at the super brief ending cinematic but the rest of the campaign is significantly better in just about every single department (especially as a function of the core gameplay, which in bethesda fallouts is shooting the fuck outta everything) so it's hard to judge

i'd say fo4 is worse because it fails to stick the jump and the landing- the first hour or two is like genuinely the worst in a series with pretty weak intros as a whole and the ending is definitively the worst despite fo3's ending existing

but the middle part and the concepts are somewhat compelling and interesting unlike fo3's extreme black/white literal fo1 low INT dialogue story. this just makes the failure to stick the landing even worse which is why there's a ton of blowback in that regard buuuuut fo4 also is like infinitely more fun as an action game when both fo3 and fo4 have incredibly linear action main quests anyways

 

[Rhaknar]

I liked the story up to the institute then it turns into a clusterfuck.

Still more insteresting than searching the whole game for your father and then fix a water pump >_>

It really just kind of sounds like the institute is trolling everyone by throwing them around.

Or maybe it's just to keep a tab on things and put them in POTENTIALLY influential positions.

Theres no potencial about it, thats exactly what they are doing...except when you get there neither you or anyone mentions it (unless I missed some dialogue with some npc).

A sidequest after you finish the game reveals the Diamond City mayor is a synth and Danse, a high ranking BoS paladin was also a synth

And there's no way to confront him about it.
Because ..Bethesda.

Except there is like I just said.

 

[mordecaii83]

I think I liked the game's story overall... The ending was a bit frustrating though.

Overally I sympathized with The Institute the most and ended up siding with them, but I hate how there was no way to at least try to negotiate with the other factions or challenge their view on Synths.

But I feel like the other factions were all as bad or worse (minus the Minutemen, but for some reason they just didn't seem all that interesting to choose). The BoS would have wanted me to wipe out The Railroad and The Institute, and the Railroad would have wanted me to wipe out The Institute and the BoS. The BoS bothered me though because they seemed a little too much like the Nazis (only pure humans, no ghouls or super mutants or synths allowed). And The Railroad bothered me because it seemed like they put the synths above humans and were too willing to kill humans for synths.

At least with The Institute I take over as leader and can (in my head at least) convince them over time to give the synths freedom and actually help the Commonwealth.

I feel like with the Minutemen nothing is really resolved because the BoS is still around and they seem a bit like tyrants to me. I like their ideals but not their fanaticism.

So in the end, I guess I just hate that everything came down to murdering huge groups of people, no other option to solve things. Oh well.

 

[Rhaknar]

I feel like with the Minutemen nothing is really resolved because the BoS is still around and they seem a bit like tyrants to me. I like their ideals but not their fanaticism.

Wait you like whose ideals? The way you wrote it sounds like the Brotherhood and you just (rightly) called them borderline Nazis

 

[ryan299]

I was so off on the twist of there being sixty years inbetween and Shaun being a grown man. I thought either the main character or his wife were snyths and Shaun was a hybrid that would lead to human evolution.

I wanted an ending that allowed me to use the Institute's tech to fix the world and kill all the snyth to ensure humanities survival. Very disappointed.

 

[PuppetMaster]

I think I liked the game's story overall... The ending was a bit frustrating though.

Overally I sympathized with The Institute the most and ended up siding with them, but I hate how there was no way to at least try to negotiate with the other factions or challenge their view on Synths.

But I feel like the other factions were all as bad or worse (minus the Minutemen, but for some reason they just didn't seem all that interesting to choose). The BoS would have wanted me to wipe out The Railroad and The Institute, and the Railroad would have wanted me to wipe out The Institute and the BoS. The BoS bothered me though because they seemed a little too much like the Nazis (only pure humans, no ghouls or super mutants or synths allowed). And The Railroad bothered me because it seemed like they put the synths above humans and were too willing to kill humans for synths.

At least with The Institute I take over as leader and can (in my head at least) convince them over time to give the synths freedom and actually help the Commonwealth.

I feel like with the Minutemen nothing is really resolved because the BoS is still around and they seem a bit like tyrants to me. I like their ideals but not their fanaticism.

So in the end, I guess I just hate that everything came down to murdering huge groups of people, no other option to solve things. Oh well.

I agree with most of this.

But I sympathized with the Railroad because they seemed like a noble selfless cause. Right up until they started murdering all the scientists in the institute and destroy a extremely valuable piece of technology just to say fuck you to the institute.

The part at the end where she says "we wiped out the institute forever" I was like do you realize how long forever is?? Given even just another 200 years another institute will easily spring out of the ashes and this will happen all over again. The moral of Fallout is that violence as a means to a greater good always ends up in more violence and destruction. They needed to find a long term solution to integrating synths. Destroying valuable irreplaceable technology and killing scientists who are extremely rare in this world is so short sighted.


The Minutemen similarly were surprisingly short sighted. They had absolutely no reason to target the institute, The institute did not give a shit about them. So nuking their reactor was totally pointless. If anything the target of the Minutemen should have been the BoS.

 

[Rhaknar]

Actually the Railroad npcs dont kill the scientists, just saying. At least mine didnt, they ran around screaming and they wouldnt attack them. I thought that was at least a neat touch.

 

[PuppetMaster]

Actually the Railroad npcs dont kill the scientists, just saying. At least mine didnt, they ran around screaming and they wouldnt attack them. I thought that was at least a neat touch.

Mine attacked me. Not all but some did. Maybe your charisma was high and you had the perk to pacify humans lower level than you?

Also I posted ealler but when you have to attack the BoS ship and the Railroad makes you blow it up. There are 2 children running around in there! Even though you don't shoot them dead, you leave them to die a fire death in an burning airship. That left me with a really bad feeling about working with the Railroad.

 

[Rhaknar]

Mine attacked me. Not all but some did. Maybe your charisma was high and you had the perk to pacify humans lower level than you?

No I dont have that. And I dont mean the scientists that attack you, I mean the ones running around screaming.

Dont get me wrong I agree with you and like I said the second half of the game is a huge clusterfuck, I just thought it was neat they didnt attack them.

Also you can sound an alarm to evacuate, in theory saving most of them... but then again that nuke looked like nit only nobody ciuld escape, but noone on the OUTSIDE would escape either in that whole section of Boston lol

And yeah lol and those kids in the Prydwen >_<

 

[Pancakes]

I think I liked the game's story overall... The ending was a bit frustrating though.

Overally I sympathized with The Institute the most and ended up siding with them, but I hate how there was no way to at least try to negotiate with the other factions or challenge their view on Synths.

But I feel like the other factions were all as bad or worse (minus the Minutemen, but for some reason they just didn't seem all that interesting to choose). The BoS would have wanted me to wipe out The Railroad and The Institute, and the Railroad would have wanted me to wipe out The Institute and the BoS. The BoS bothered me though because they seemed a little too much like the Nazis (only pure humans, no ghouls or super mutants or synths allowed). And The Railroad bothered me because it seemed like they put the synths above humans and were too willing to kill humans for synths.

At least with The Institute I take over as leader and can (in my head at least) convince them over time to give the synths freedom and actually help the Commonwealth.

I feel like with the Minutemen nothing is really resolved because the BoS is still around and they seem a bit like tyrants to me. I like their ideals but not their fanaticism.

So in the end, I guess I just hate that everything came down to murdering huge groups of people, no other option to solve things. Oh well.

I agree with this 100%. I had like 13 Charisma and there was no way to negotiate a certain peace between the factions which was ridiculous to me. I understand Beth wanted there to be hard choices but the Institute (under the player character's rule) is easily the best hope for humanity that exists. The only reason the brotherhood want to wipe them out is because they have synths and tech and therefore they must die for it (They're basically the Enclave now). At least in New Vegas you could negotiate peace between the Brotherhood and the NCR.

It's frustrating how little player agency and freedom I actually had in the main story.

 

[jrcbandit]

I agree with most of this.

But I sympathized with the Railroad because they seemed like a noble selfless cause. Right up until they started murdering all the scientists in the institute and destroy a extremely valuable piece of technology just to say fuck you to the institute.

The part at the end where she says "we wiped out the institute forever" I was like do you realize how long forever is?? Given even just another 200 years another institute will easily spring out of the ashes and this will happen all over again. The moral of Fallout is that violence as a means to a greater good always ends up in more violence and destruction. They needed to find a long term solution to integrating synths. Destroying valuable irreplaceable technology and killing scientists who are extremely rare in this world is so short sighted.


The Minutemen similarly were surprisingly short sighted. They had absolutely no reason to target the institute, The institute did not give a shit about them. So nuking their reactor was totally pointless. If anything the target of the Minutemen should have been the BoS.

Yeah, the Minutemen stuff made no sense. There was no logical reason for the Institute to attack the Castle (no threat technology wise like the Brotherhood and no direct threat to their ideology regarding synths like the Railroad), it was just put in there by Bethesda to make players feel justified in nuking the Institute in the next mission.

 

[PuppetMaster]

I agree with this 100%. I had like 13 Charisma and there was no way to negotiate a certain peace between the factions which was ridiculous to me. I understand Beth wanted there to be hard choices but the Institute (under the player character's rule) is easily the best hope for humanity that exists. The only reason the brotherhood want to wipe them out is because they have synths and tech and therefore they must die for it (They're basically the Enclave now). At least in New Vegas you could negotiate peace between the Brotherhood and the NCR.

It's frustrating how little player agency and freedom I actually had in the main story.

I would say my ideal ending, and something that would have left me very satisfied is if I got to take over the institute (the game already let me do this) and then use my new power to change the policy of the institute to be fairer to synths and not treat them like slaves. Then make peace with the RR. And reach out to the Minutemen as their friends. I was the general after all! If we did have to wipe out one faction it would be the BoS only because they were a direct and immediate threat to our existence.

And I don't think I am asking for too much. All it would have taken is a couple more dialog choices and a new ending cut scene!

 

[Pancakes]

I would say my ideal ending, and something that would have left me very satisfied is if I got to take over the institute (the game already let me do this) and then use my new power to change the policy of the institute to be fairer to synths and not treat them like slaves. Then make peace with the RR. And reach out to the Minutemen as their friends. I was the general after all! If we did have to wipe out one faction it would be the BoS only because they were a direct and immediate threat to our existence.

And I don't think I am asking for too much. All it would have taken is a couple more dialog choices and a new ending cut scene!

Imagine if we could have a conversation like this with Maxson or Father.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBAHzsqBmCA

How great it would be to be able to turn around someone's ideals with some actual logic and great writing. Maybe even have Father meet Elder Maxson and have them verbally duke it out. So much potential, just wasted.

 

[wildbite]

I convinced Dr. Li to go to the Brotherhood. If I end up siding with The Institute, does Dr. Li die? I might load an earlier save and not encourage her to leave The Institute.

 

[Pancakes]

I convinced Dr. Li to go to the Brotherhood. If I end up siding with The Institute, does Dr. Li die? I might load an earlier save and not encourage her to leave The Institute.

I did the same thing.

I personally didn't see her body among the carnage nor speak with her but I'm 99% sure she does not survive the onslaught.

 

[wildbite]

I did the same thing.

I personally didn't see her body among the carnage nor speak with her but I'm 99% sure she does not survive the onslaught.

Thanks! I will go back and try to avoid convincing her to leave.

I'm going to assume if you side against the Brotherhood, you can no longer use or buy the Vertibird grenades?

 

[Seyavesh]

Thanks! I will go back and try to avoid convincing her to leave.

I'm going to assume if you side against the Brotherhood, you can no longer use or buy the Vertibird grenades?

if you side with railroad, you actually get to keep using them

 

[Tainted]

Any confirmation on the number of different endings ? There's at least 4 I would imagine (one for each faction)...but are there more splits within each faction as well ?

 

[Blue Ninja]

Actually the Railroad npcs dont kill the scientists, just saying. At least mine didnt, they ran around screaming and they wouldnt attack them. I thought that was at least a neat touch.

Brotherhood didn't, either. When I saw that 'evacuate' option I assumed that'd make all the hostile synths evacuate as well, which is why I didn't activate it. Feel kinda bad about that one now. :lol

Any confirmation on the number of different endings ? There's at least 4 I would imagine (one for each faction)...but are there more splits within each faction as well ?

I think there's only four, yeah. Either you side with the Minutemen, the Brotherhood, the Railroad or the Institute. From what I can tell, each faction will require you to wipe out at least one of the others. The Minutemen attack the Institute and have a quest to shoot down the Prydwen. The Railroad destroys the Prydwen and then attacks the Institute. The Brotherhood eliminates the Railroad and then the Institute. The Institute kills the Railroad and then shoots down the Prydwen.

I wish there was a way to force some of the sides to work together, New Vegas-style. I wanted an assault on the Institute with the Railroad infiltrating and evacuating civilians, the Brotherhood destroying the Institute and the Minutemen helping out. Kinda sad that something like that doesn't seem to be an option.

As it is, there is no 'good' or 'bad' ending. Which is good in its own way, but it's a shame there's no way to actually influence your ending aside from that one choice you make.

 

[David Incorporated Esq.]

You know what it is with the Institute? Minus the synth issue, they were a legitimate and nearly pure force for good. Bethesda wanted moral grey areas so they had to shoehorn a marginal evil into the Institute's lore to remove the easy choice. With how inescapable their use of synths was, them being morally grey was clearly more important to Bethesda than weaving a coherent story.

Disappointed.

 

[Blue Ninja]

Is it ever really explained why they're replacing people with synths, and what they do with the people they're replacing?

 

[Coll1der]

The Diamond Radio DJ quest line that changes his personality.

Erm, not that different from doing just another radio or adding BREAKING NEWS. The music is still the same. Radio interaction has been a staple of games with Radio since GTA3. And the quest itself is heavily linear.

Nick the detective and that mobster who intentionally made himself a ghoul.

Nick is a walking cliche with no personality. It's like a parody on Noir rather than a pastiche. And the whole noir mobster thing doesn't make much sense in the context. At least in FO2 they had a genuine environment - a city full of casinos and stills.

The stolen deatclaw egg thing. Very cool!

What was cool about that? Get there, kill the Deathclaw and get money for the egg? One of the laziest quest designs I've ever seen. It's literally a fetch one, without a plot whatsoever and without a questgiver to boot.

I acknowledge that different people have different taste in narrative and maybe I am too experience in consuming quality narrative from all kinds of media, but man... It's a difficult pill to swallow after FNV. The whole "tackle quests how you see fit" aspect of Fallout franchise is totally lost on FO4.

 

[hamchan]

You know what it is with the Institute? Minus the synth issue, they were a legitimate and nearly pure force for good. Bethesda wanted moral grey areas so they had to shoehorn a marginal evil into the Institute's lore to remove the easy choice. With how inescapable their use of synths was, them being morally grey was clearly more important to Bethesda than weaving a coherent story.

Disappointed.

Nothing is wrong with them. They are legitimately the good guys and why I sided with them. Ultimately the Institute are the ones with the most chance to actually improve the world while the Railroad are just small time hippies with no plan and the Brotherhood are a group of nut jobs.

 

[Cob32]

If you side with the Minutemen do you end up killing the other 3 factions?

 

[Noray]

Nothing is wrong with them. They are legitimately the good guys and why I sided with them. Ultimately the Institute are the ones with the most chance to actually improve the world while the Railroad are just small time hippies with no plan and the Brotherhood are a group of nut jobs.

You think treating people like slaves is "good guys"? Okay then

 

[Blue Ninja]

If you side with the Minutemen do you end up killing the other 3 factions?

From what I read (I went with the Brotherhood myself), you destroy the Institute and afterwards get a quest to shoot down the Prydwen with artillery. Not sure if there's a quest to attack the Railroad as well.

And yeah, there are no 'good guys' in this game. Railroad is short-sighted, Brotherhood is too fanatical and the Institute is just plain weird.

What was cool about that? Get there, kill the Deathclaw and get money for the egg? One of the laziest quest designs I've ever seen. It's literally a fetch one, without a plot whatsoever and without a questgiver to boot.

You can return the egg to the Deathclaw instead. You know, complete the quest the way you want.

 

[Teletraan1]

The first minute I saw that kid get kidnapped I knew I would have to fight him, I also figured that he would be older since you pass out after the kidnapping, then the first time I heard that the institute was kidnapping people and understood what they were about I knew he would show up as a synth. Probably the least surprising and corny outcome.

I had zero attachment to a kid that you play with once before getting frozen. The gravitas of the entire situation is completely lost because of the rushed beginning. I guess they wanted to get into the game faster without complaints like they faced with Skyrim with its drawn out carriage ride. It could have been handled a lot better. I think they should have had some time in the vault before getting frozen. They could have had you sequestered in an area of the vault before getting moved to the cryo chamber. Then perhaps they could have had more story there that actually made me care about the son.

 

[Count of Monte Sawed-Off]

The first minute I saw that kid get kidnapped I knew I would have to fight him, I also figured that he would be older since you pass out after the kidnapping, then the first time I heard that the institute was kidnapping people and understood what they were about I knew he would show up as a synth. Probably the least surprising and corny outcome.

I had zero attachment to a kid that you play with once before getting frozen. The gravitas of the entire situation is completely lost because of the rushed beginning. I guess they wanted to get into the game faster without complaints like they faced with Skyrim with its drawn out carriage ride. It could have been handled a lot better. I think they should have had some time in the vault before getting frozen. They could have had you sequestered in an area of the vault before getting moved to the cryo chamber. Then perhaps they could have had more story there that actually made me care about the son.

They definitely should have done more with the beginning. That's the one area where Fallout 3 was definitely better. Although after playing MGSV tortureious intro, I did somewhat appreciate them mostly just throwing you out there.

 

[Emperor_Uriel]

Nothing is wrong with them. They are legitimately the good guys and why I sided with them. Ultimately the Institute are the ones with the most chance to actually improve the world while the Railroad are just small time hippies with no plan and the Brotherhood are a group of nut jobs.

It does create an unusual issue. Do you lead the people who have a bright vision for mankind's future, even if it means that the ignorant and paranoid wastelanders will fear and revile you for supporting a group they don't understand?

But, I'll say that playing a lot post-game has really reinforced my notion that helping the Institute was the right thing to do. I'm seeing Synths hanging out in major areas, spreading messages of peace, so it's not like people will think of them as bogeymen for much longer.

That, and they're actively cleaning shit up. All over the Commonwealth, I'm running into groups of synths taking out raiders, gunners and mutants without any innocent casualties. Pretty good.